UMass Dartmouth campus "secure" but still closed after search of bombing suspect's dorm

Friday

Apr 19, 2013 at 12:01 AMApr 19, 2013 at 7:13 PM

The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth remains closed today as law enforcement officials continue their investigation into a student suspected as the Boston Marathon bomber.

The university said in a written statement today that campus and law enforcement officials continue "logistical and investigative operations."

The campus was evacuated Friday morning amid a manhunt for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. He was captured Friday night in Watertown and is in serious condition at a Boston hospital. His older brother, Tamerlan, was killed in a shootout with police

Will Richmond

The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth remains closed today as law enforcement officials continue their investigation into a student suspected as the Boston Marathon bomber.

The university said in a written statement today that campus and law enforcement officials continue "logistical and investigative operations."

The campus was evacuated Friday morning amid a manhunt for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. He was captured Friday night in Watertown and is in serious condition at a Boston hospital. His older brother, Tamerlan, was killed in a shootout with police.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev lived on the third floor of the Pine Dale dormitory. His classmates say that they saw him on campus after the bombings and that he was calm.

The school wouldn't say what he was studying there.

After a day filled with action on the state university campus that included constant presence of law enforcement vehicles, military-type helicopters and bomb squad units, university Chancellor Divina Grossman released a statement thanking those who responded to the campus and that following an “extensive search” the campus is once again safe.

“Law enforcement and university officials, operating with an abundance of caution, have determined that the campus is safe. We are grateful that the suspect identified as one of our students is in police custody. After an extensive search of the campus, including a thorough inspection of the student’s residence hall room, police have concluded that the campus is secure,” Grossman stated. “Due to logical considerations the campus remains closed. An update on the campus status will be released Saturday.”

The statement continued with Grossman noting the orderly evacuation of the campus and offered the university’s sympathies to the victims of the marathon bombing.

“On behalf of the UMass Dartmouth family, I want to extend my deepest appreciation t the many law enforcement officials who came to our campus help protect the safety of our community. UMass Dartmouth had a system in place to ensure our campus was notified and evacuated in an efficient and effective manner. Our evacuation was calm and safe, and our faculty, staff and students performed admirably throughout the process,” the statement reads.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and families affected by this week’s tragic events. UMass Dartmouth is committed to being part of the healing process that will unfold in the days and weeks ahead.”

Student evacuation

Included in the focus was the Pine Dale Hall, where 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev reportedly resided. Students said they were awakened Friday morning to text messages from the school alerting them the campus was being closed. The order left students scrambling to exit the campus. Cars packed with students lined the only road out, while students with no ride scurried on foot, some dragging wheeled pieces of luggage and others filling items such as laundry bags with whatever possessions they could grab.

Bianca Auletta, a freshman, had two friends visiting and received the notification Friday morning to evacuate the campus. The order left the trio scrambling to retrieve their clothing and started walking toward the school exit in an effort to reach someone who would provide a ride home.

“My main goal is just to get out and get my friends out, “ Auletta said. “It’s just scary, you don’t think it could happen like that.”

As students moved toward the exit, a fire alarm blared from the area of Pine Dale Hall and police strung yellow crime scene tape around the building. Some students still milled about, unsure about their next steps.

“I feel like he’s not here, so we’re safe,” sophomore Carole Giannopoulous said as she and a friend sat in her car, parked a few feet from the dorm.

Some left the campus immediately after the alert was issued figuring they would be able to return, only to find police guarding the entrance and stopping them from returning. Others began to realize the connection between Tsarnaev and the Dartmouth campus.

Gabriel DeSouza, a junior from Cape Cod who has an internship at Government Center in Fall River, said he recognized Tsarnaev from the widely publicized photos.

“All my friends were like, ‘I played soccer against him,’” said DeSouza, sharing his reaction to the bizarre events. “He was on a different team than I played on."

“I’ve probably seen this kid 100 times, and for it to have gotten to this point, it must have been something really bad,” DeSouza said. “It’s very eerie, very unexpected.”

James Tice, Josh Nichols and Ryan Smolinski said they met Tsarnaev earlier in the year when he rushed their fraternity.

“He was a really quiet kid,” Tice said. “It’s scary to think we were that close to evil.”
“He was normal, seemed like a decent kid,” Nichols added.

Aidan Nsubuga, a sophomore, said he lived in Pine Dale Hall with Tsarnaev but never thought he would do something such as the marathon bombing.

“He was the kind of person who just walked by and said hi” Nsubuga said.

But another student had a different take.

“To me, there always seemed to be something going on in the back of his mind, that he was contemplating something,” sophomore Tim Walsh said.

But Tsarnaev seemed like a nice, quiet kid, said Walsh, so when he found out Tsarnaev was a suspect in the bombing, it was surprising.

As students exited the school, the tactical unit established in Lot 6 could be seen stopping a man a gunpoint. He was ordered to his knees at gunpoint and could be seen lifting up his shirt. Officers then ordered the man to his stomach, where they proceeded to pat him down. He was then moved to a vehicle in the lot, with his hands appearing secured behind his back.

John Hoey, chief of staff at UMass Dartmouth, said he was not at liberty to say when the suspect was last known to be on campus and declined to give any information about his major or interests at the university, except to confirm he was a sophomore. Hoey reported the campus was cleared of students by about 1 p.m. and said he thought the university responded well to the demands of evacuating 4,300 residential students, 1,500 employees and probably another 1,000 to 2,000 commuting students by early afternoon Friday.

In conjunction with Dartmouth officials, the school moved hundreds of students to Dartmouth High School — where students were on spring break — to wait for rides, and be fed and kept comfortable, Hoey said.

By 3:30 p.m., all of the students had been picked up, while an additional 40 to 50 who did not have a place to go were put up in hotels.

Hoey also stated that, in addition to Friday’s closure, the Dartmouth campus would remained closed today.

Tactical response

As students exited, law enforcement entered. Parking Lot 6 appeared to become a staging area, with tactical units in heavy armor standing by, along with an armored vehicle. They were later joined by a Dartmouth ladder truck, ambulances and K9 units from the towns of Bridgewater and Plympton. Police units from New Bedford and Dartmouth and the Massachusetts State Police response command truck could also be seen.

A fire alarm rang out from the building, while yellow crime scene tape was strung around the exterior. A Rhode Island fire marshal bomb squad unit was seen leaving the campus’ public safety facility around 1 p.m. and moved to the Liberal Arts building, where K9 units could be seen scouring the interior and exterior. Those units then could be seen heading down the driveway toward Pine Dale Hall.

Twice during the afternoon, helicopters descended on the campus. The first occasion included two helicopters that landed in the open field near the university’s wind turbine. The second time, additional personnel were dropped off and were picked up by an armored tactical truck.

The afternoon into early evening witnessed a carousel of vehicles entering and exiting the campus. At about 3:15 p.m., a dozen marked state police cruisers entered the campus at a high speed with lights flashing. They were followed minutes later by nearly a dozen more vehicles with license plates from locations such as Connecticut, Virginia, New York and Massachusetts.

Those watching the action at the UMass Dartmouth got a good look at the tactics and equipment law enforcement have at the ready.

There were two armored vehicles on the college campus, one a humvee and one that appeared to be a more heavily armored MRAP vehicle designed to withstand bomb blasts.

The personnel in the MRAP wore helmets and full tactical body armor.

There were a half-dozen civilian vehicle with heavily tinted side windows. Some of the personnel in those cars were also wearing helmets and full body armor. Though many of those cars bore license plates from other states, the cars had flashing blue lights and were waved through the checkpoint University of Massachusetts Police operated at the entrance to the UMass Dartmouth campus.

At least two of the seven officers at the entrance carried assault rifles. They arranged their cruisers so that vehicles entering the campus had to slow and thread their way through parked cars.

The college campus was the staging ground for operations in this part of the state. When a call related to the manhunt came from New Bedford, more than a dozen cars and cruisers left the campus, heading east.